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Hail, Césars

February 27, 2011

To no one’s surprise, “Of Gods and Men” won the best picture award at France’s César ceremonies Friday night (Michael Lonsdale won best supporting actor for his work on the film, and its director of photography, Caroline Champetier, won for best cinematography). Last week, I wrote about the film’s immediate political import for French viewers; here’s what its director, Xavier Beauvois, said on the podium upon receiving the award:

In the coming electoral campaign, I don’t want people to speak ill of French Muslims; I want people to be with them, that’s the lesson of the film.

And it is. Meanwhile, Roman Polanski’s “The Ghost Writer” took four awards, including best director. On the podium, Polanski said:

I’m not in the habit of making speeches, but since this film was finished in jail, I’d like to thank everyone without whom this couldn’t have come about, everyone who supported me, first of all, my wife, my daughter, my son, my associates, Alain Sarde, Robert Benmussa [two of the producers], all my other friends, like Xavier Beauvois, and everyone else who supported me.

The film’s editor, Hervé de Luze, won an award too, and said,

At the time, everything was going wrong in Roman’s life. His life was falling apart. And that stimulated us; we said to ourselves, “We at least owe him this.” I finished editing the film during three days in prison with him.

When Polanski’s film came out here last year at this time, I wrote in admiration of the its precise and tight-lipped visual style—but wondered whether its classicism is connected precisely to nostalgia for a world in which intimate secrets remained secret.

And the best foreign film? “The Social Network.” (“The King’s Speech” wasn’t eligible—it opened in France only this month.)